Michael Dell's private buy-out in trouble

Silver Lake running dry

The company's special committee rejected their request to change the voting rules in exchange for them offering $150 million more.

On the back of the news Dell shares fell more than four percent to a dismal $12.28, their lowest level since news of the takeover broke in January.

According to Reuters, the special committee, set up by Dell's board to assess whether shareholders were getting the best deal, refused to make changes the voting rules to make it easier for the Dell / Silverlake deal to go through.

Michael Dell thinks that the deal will collapse unless there are changes to the voting laws similar to what Mugabe managed in Zimbabwe.

At present, the buyout must be approved by a majority of all Dell shares, excluding the 15.7 percent stake owned by Dell and his chums.

The buyout group last week raised its offer by 10 cents per share on the condition that the deal goes through if approved by a majority of the shares that are actually voted.

This is because the two attempts that Dell has had pushing the deal through with shareholders did not have enough votes supporting the deal.

Dell's problem is that uncounted votes are counted as a "no".

The consortium estimated that in the latest tally, about 27 percent of Dell's shares had not been voted and were therefore counted as "no" votes under the current voting standard.

Alex Mandl, the special committee's chairman, said that they were not going to give Dell what he wanted on voting, it was prepared to bring the voting date forward.

Reuters claimed that the special committee would be willing to push the record date to 10 August for the vote to be held on 10 September.